Talk:Animal companion/Archive2009-2010

The Suits of Armor?

If I want to evolve my pet into evolve my pet into agressive, would the suits of armor help me? (Isle of th enameless, training dummies, deal no damage) Ninjas In The Sky 17:27, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't think that will work, you won't get any XP from the dummies, so the pet won't lvl up. (This is total speculation but i reckon that every time a pet gains XP, it's checked to see how much damage it delt and recived since the last time it gained XP, or something along those lines). It is a good way of dishing out damage with no damage return though. Titan Crow 09:53 01 Fedruary 2008 (UTC)

Oh, ok, thx man. Ninjas In The Sky 17:29, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Removal of damage type table

Why was this removed? -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 02:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

A number of other items were also removed. My quick read of the history is that someone was editing something else and the loss of other items amounts to collateral damage. As there has been no response here on the talk page, I have taken the liberty of restoring the damage type table and the available types of animals (with some style/phrasing adjustments to both).

If someone really thinks those tables should be removed, please discuss on this page before taking action. Thanks! Tennessee Ernie Ford 06:56, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Level 20 Non-Evolved Raven

So, I just used a death leveling attempt in order to get a dire raven and ended up with a level 20 raven that has no evolution. The way I did this was I put on 5 superior runes and let the raven kill me twice in order to get me down to 1 health. I then allowed my heroes to continually resurrect me with Resurrect. Each time I got rez'd, I immediately died and the raven gained experience. I know the raven attacked my heroes and me a bit, so he did deal some damage, although no damage was dealt to him. Once he reached level 20, I charmed him, reset his name, and it still said Raven. I then mapped back to a town, rezoned, and reset the name again with no luck. I also checked his health and he has 480 HP just like an elder pet, without the elder title. Has anyone else had this problem before? Any suggestions? Also, this probably should be added to the wiki once we have some idea what's going on. Blood Red Giant 19:20, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Also, the pet is level 20 and quite small. If anyone wants to confirm, just pm me in game (Cathy Barrett). Blood Red Giant 19:23, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

From my experiance in death leaveling pets (I'v done a few dozen now) the pet never evolves in size or evolution, only in level. You will always end up with a Non-evolved "Elder" pet (with the stats of an Elder but without the name). Titan Crow 18:26 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, I figured out if you just sit there and let the desired pet hit you for about 15-30 min without dying (letting your monk heal you), then it will do enough damage to become dire once you death level him. From my experiences I believe there to be a range of damage for lack of evolution. If the pet deals enough damage to get above that range then it will evolve towards damage (i.e. nothing->aggressive for lvl 11 and nothing->aggressive, aggressive->dire, playful->elder for lvl 15). Also, if the pet takes enough damage to get below that range then it will evolve towards health (i.e. nothing->playful for lvl 11 and nothing->playful, playful->hearty, aggressive->elder for lvl 15). Lastly, if the pet hits in that range, then it simply won't evolve (nothing->nothing for lvl 11 and nothing->nothing, aggressive->aggressive, playful->playful for lvl 15). Of course that's just from my own personal experiences. Also, seeing as this range seems very small (only < 15-30 min of damage to lean towards damage), it would be difficult to test some of those combinations, such as the nothing->aggressive->aggressive. Blood Red Giant 03:58, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Thats well interesting, I'd not thought to just leave it do damage before leveling it. Im going to experiment with that now and get back to you with anything I find. I don't suppose you've had any experience in evolving an Eldar pet? I can get Dire and Hearty every time but never a real elder pet (i can get a Non-evolved one every time with death-leveling). Titan Crow 14:01 22 March 2009 (UTC

I've gotten an elder pet before, but it required me death leveling the pet to level 11, charming it as aggressive, and the having it die as many times as I can manage (0 beast mastery). By the time the pet got to level 15, it had taken enough damage to be elder. Blood Red Giant 00:21, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

My suggestion: use Flesh of My Flesh as a res skill instead of Resurrect. This way, with runes and dp, you have only 1 hp but you won't die instantly, so the pet has to attack you. It takes some more time (30-45 mins), but the pets become dire (tested with a flamingo). I use a mesmer hero with maxed fast casting, Flesh of My Flesh and some self-heal, and a BiP necro to provide the mesmer's energy.QED 19:40, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Devourer Pet

I've done Saul's Story Many times and have noticed some of the charr have devourer pets.... Why can't we have them as well? I suggest that we should be able to tame one after completing Rraragar's Meanagerie, or some other charr mission. {skill icon|Abyssal} 21:04, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

ArenaNet:Guild Wars suggestions — Why 17:55, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Faster Method to Death Level

I have found that a faster method of leveling up pets before they are charmed is to use Unyielding Aura as your Monk's main resurrect, paired with 4 or 12 points into Air Mastery for Glyph of Swiftness. Instant resurrection at a second or less casting time (albeit a tad chaotic with the teleportation) in around 8 seconds or less recharge; the very same as Resurrect's! Additionally, the would-be pet deals so little damage that Unyielding Aura acts as the hero's self heal. (Assuming you have points into Divine Favor.) Pairing this with the Hero's continual kiting negates the need to bring any other healing spell. I have leveled a pet to 20 (Unevolved Status) in this way in around 20 minutes. -- Quiesce 15:24, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, you can track the progress of the pet you are death leveling by Control + Attacking/Following the pet, calling it out. It will state its current evolution when it reaches those respective levels. And, I timed a training for a Dire Jahai Rat for my Vekk; with two Monks using the above aforementioned build and Vekk using Quickening Zephyr, it took around 25 minutes instead. That is impressive, being I had to slow down my death rate by using Frenzy and low/no armor for it deal enough damage to me to evolve! -- Quiesce 19:52, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

On three attempts to train 2 different pets up to Dire in this way; all three have turned out to be Elder instead. Could it be because they are Eye of the North pets? Strange... So much for it being difficult to train to Elder... -- Quiesce 14:49, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Did you train it to Elder, or Unevolved? They both have the same stats at level 20. The only way to tell is to reset the pet's name with /petname and see if the word Elder is before the petname. Blood Red Giant 16:49, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

trained up to 5 pets so far to dire this way using Unyielding Aura on my hero with dash so he loses aggro a bit faster. with minimum armour of 35 on my war all sup runes to get my health down to 55hp (1hp with bit of dp eventually) trick to get your pet to dire is that you let him do all the dmg so only one aggro of pet with charm or a bow shot rest of time leave him to kill you till he's 20 charm him and then his name will change to dire if done correctly (don't use a vamp-weapon's cause the pet has to kill you with is dmg to make him dire)--Elliot 18:43, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

For the above question; they trained to Elder. Maybe it is because I am not letting it deal quite enough damage to me. I do have a vampiric weapon that I use to insta-kill myself for it to level faster--but i'm always careful to use it only after it reaches level 11 by SOLELY killing me with high (me using Frenzy) damage. Before I had posted this faster method--I was getting Dire pets left and right. Though; all of my Elder pets have been EotN in origin so far. Still seems strange to me. -- Quiesce 23:45, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Managed to unlock an agressive wolf using a PvP character and death leveling.

• Turn in lvl20 unevolved (elder wolf) (unlock tier 6)
• retrieve lvl15 agressive (tier 5) (from trainer)
• deathlevel him to lvl20
• charm animal.
• Turn in lvl20 evolved (Agressive wolf) (unlock tier 7)

--85.149.120.16 00:26, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

If im not mistaken, you should have DLed him to DIRE, not AGRESSIVE, right?

If you look at the chart, you will notice that tier 7 includes all evolutions (aggressive/playful & dire/hearty) so simply getting it to not elder should be enough.--70.190.221.30 01:08, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

I've used death levelling to get all evolutions from 14 pet species unlocked in the menagerie by starting with a lv 12 agressive and death levelling with heroes from there (1hp, unyielding aura). Every time, except with the Crane, it came out Dire at level 20. The first Crane evolved into Elder. Didn't change anything each time, and just levelled 5 pets one right after the other in the same instance, with the first 3 becoming Dire, the first Crane Elder, and the last Crane Dire also. Magua 05:03, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Rework of page layout

would it be usefull to have a table that linked you to were all the pets are like this

By Charm Location

• All
• Prophecies
• Factions
• Nightfall
• Eye of the North

75.165.119.187 01:52, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

scratch the idea i had before. i think this page needs to be cleaned up.... the information seems very disorganized and the page it self is too long. 75.165.119.187 07:35, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Zaishen Menagerie

I think that info doesn't belong on this page and should go elsewhere. — Why 18:08, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I think the article should contain some information on the Zaishen Menagerie. After the menagerie is in the game, I think the information should probably be incorporated into the changing & retraining pets and evolution sections, however I would like it to stay separate now to prevent unimplemented content from being confused with implemented content, and to warn players who might be thinking of replacing their pets about the upcoming changes. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 23:39, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Shouldnt we add the info to the animals that Silavor [Zaishen Naturalist] gives? It would be nice. 80.127.24.20 10:48, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Evolving an aggressive pet into an elder pet is difficult, and evolving a playful pet into an elder pet is nearly impossible. Every time I'm in the menagerie and start with a level 12 Aggressive or Playful pet and use the 1hp, vampiric weapon, UA on heroes method, and by the time they hit 15 they're elder, and they stay that way up 'til and after they hit 20. Not difficult if you're wanting an elder pet. --BellonaBacchus

Expanding the individual animal articles

I think we should include the relevant dialogue from Salome and Silavor in the various animal articles, either in the introductory sections or the trivia sections. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 05:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

While reworking those pages, applying some standardization (sp?) would be nice as well.

There are some pages linking to "charmable", while others link to "animal" (both of which redirect to "charmable animal").

There is one (or maybe two) page that links to "animal companion" (which is not the same as "charmable animal"), though...

And singular/plural doesn't seem to be consistent either.

Yeah, I could edit some of them, but I get lost when there is not a "right one" to change "the wrong ones" into. :P --NIN37 01:00, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

well what article do you think looks best i guess is the best way to go about making a "right one", also i think the pages should have Acquisition and then under that have the price and locations including where they can be found in the z-zoo also have what Silavor has to say about each pet along with what Salome says at the top of each page as a description of each pet. ill edit one of the pages to reflect what i am talking about.here is my example of what i think the pages should look like. maybe edit the quotes so they go together? -- Zesbeer 01:22, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Animal articles could use some more standardization. Not all of them indicate, for example, the type of damage the pet does. MithTalk 03:45, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Damage type was added (while adding nav bar + unlock costs) for those that were listed under "known damage type" (basically, I had skipped those once marked as "variant" - and was lazy to check back once detailed info stating what particular evolution would give what type of damage).

Unlocking cost is a neat piece of information, but I don't think it is that vital: once a player unlocks a pet, that info becomes somehow useless (can't be unlocked again on the same account, eh?). Well, we do not list how much Master's Reward is worth (skill point + gold + xp) on every single mission page, nor how many Balthazar factions are needed to unlock each upgrade, so we should not need to list individual one-time costs to unlock pets, but guess leaving that info there (mainly because it's still recent) should not harm (and there isn't really much content to put into those pages).

Since only "prestige pets" had such info, I added similar info to every available pet (adding prestige/common & tyria/cantha/elona basic info as well, through a very poor two-word non-verbal sentence, so people would no longer get frustrated trying to figure out why Rainbow Phoenix was not listed under Prestige/Exotic list :P). and I misspelled exotic in both Moss Spider and Black Widow pages... If no one fixes that before me, I'll check them when I wake up.

But, even though I said I don't think unlocking cost is that important, since every and each single pet (excluding a couple of Prophecies multi-named creatures) share that info, shouldn't "NPC infobox" template be tweaked to accept it?

@Zesbeer: if there are too many quotes (I don't even know where you got that second one :P), maybe using henchmen's battle quote structure?

A bit off-topic: what would be the exact distinction between "Animal companion" and "Charmable animal"? Former would be Allied dudes who faithfully follow your party (as long as Charm Animal is equipped), while later ones would be NPC that spawn in the map (and can be charmed to become former ones) and just roam around? --NIN37 07:26, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Animal Companion is the term used in skills for an already charmed pet. Just 'Animal' is the term used in the wiki and skills for not charmed animals that can be charmed. 'Pet' is the short term used by many players since it appears in the party panel. But they are all basically the same thing. 'Charmable animal' it's a term to make stronger the diferenciate Beasts from Animals, since all Beats look like animals and some even like charmable animals. MithTalk 14:24, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

i got them from the Silavor & Salome npcs -- Zesbeer 21:20, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

No one has even tried this?

ok well i cant find it anywhere so i don't think anyone has tried but with the new garden thing you can spawn lvl 12s lvl15s and lvl 20s...so this hasn't been asked or answered (on any of the pet pages) how much higher than you can the pet be? i was lvl 9 and i couldnt tame a lvl 15 so i know its less than 6 lvls but i could tame a lvl 12 so i know its more than 3

10:06, 28 April 2009 (UTC) Nightwing Out --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:Sryth (talk).

See Charm Animal, and I am sorry but comments cannot be removed from talk pages.. — Why 15:38, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Game_updates/20090423#Miscellaneous --NIN37 02:59, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Update pet damage type

Just noticed ingame that the NPC Silavor has a dialogue about each pet in the game and mentions their damage type for most of the pet. Shouldn't this be added to the pet damage table so that it would be finally updated or does someone need to verify this first? --SkyHiRider 02:13, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

I think it is being researched, since some pets change damage type during evolution. - anja 05:07, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

It would be nice if we could get a bit more information on the pets with damage types that vary based on evolution. I'll see what I can do about collecting the information, but it will be a while before I can get on GW to do it. Also, would we like this information to be placed on this page, the individual animal pages, or both? Blood Red Giant 01:03, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm slowly unclocking all the pets, and my main first class is ranger, so if I can be any help, leave a message too, I'll see what if I can do it. —Faalagorn☎/✓ 13:30, 29 May 2009 (UTC).

Well I went through them all manually and put them into categories, however the ones that are in variable were extremly annoying to categorise, so I'm not going near them again. (especially the bloody rainbow phoenix which changes its attacks at whim it seems) So best of luck to anyone who wants to sort them out more. -- Salome 13:33, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

I had a little bit of time today to start researching and I've got the first few animals done. In order to test the damage types, I took a character with Paragon Secondary, removed all armor, and brought the skill Bladeturn Refrain at r12 (+34 armor vs. slashing). This caused a major difference in damage between slashing and piercing whenever the skill was activated. Also, to get a general idea of the damage range I was looking for, I tested the black bear and the albino rat assuming the damage types in our current table were correct. However, after further testing, it seems the albino rat deals slashing damage at level 20 no matter what the evolution instead of the stated piercing damage. Thus, I instead used the black widow spider as my base range for piercing damage. This is some of the data I've collected so far (all creatures tested were level 20):

• albino rat: Slashing - All evolutions
• black bear: Slashing - All evolutions
• black moa: Slashing - All evolutions
• black widow spider: Piercing - All evolutions
• black wolf: Slashing - All evolutions
• crane: Piercing - All evolutions
• white moa: Piercing - Hearty, Playful, Elder, Aggressive; Slashing - Dire

After reading Silavor's comments on some of the pets that were labeled wrong, it seems these pets change type as they change levels instead of being based on evolutions (or the damage type for 'unevolved' is different from the other evolutions). However, this will be much more difficult to test as I cannot request unevolved pets in the Zaishen Menagerie.

Lastly, since the white moa is used as an example in varying damage types, I'm updating the page to reflect the new data.

Blood Red Giant 15:54, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Odd as I tested using 2 sins vs a pet, one wearing armour defensive against piercing and one defensive against slashing and I swear I noticed a difference in all the pets in the variant column, I must have done something wrong. (hmm.... ponders) -- Salome 16:37, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, we are working under the assumption that the damage type is solely dependent on Evolution, Level, and Species. If there are any other factors or even any randomness, it would skew the data. Blood Red Giant 18:10, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Reset Indent I'm finished running through all of the evolutions of level 20 pets in the Zaishen Menagerie!!! With the small exception of the moss spider, since that is not unlocked on my account yet. Anyways, to the data. First off, it I will once again note that I am strictly testing whether or not the animal does slashing damage. However, if it does not do slashing damage, I am assuming it does piercing damage. Proof of blunt damage will require additional research. Second, in researching I found very little variance in damage type versus evolution. In fact, the animals all fit within three different categories: all slashing, all piercing, and Hearty-Playful-Elder-Aggressive piercing : Dire slashing. I will be testing unevolved pets next to see if they have different damage types as well in accordance with some of Silavor's statements (for example with the crane). Now to the results! (this list includes results already in my last post)

• All Evolutions-slashing: albino rat, black bear, black moa, black wolf, crocodile, hyena, iguana, Jahai rat, jingle bear, lion, lioness, lurker, lynx, Melandru's stalker, polar bear, reef lurker, tiger, warthog, white tiger, white wolf, wolf
• All Evolutions-piercing: black widow spider, crane, dune lizard, flamingo, moa bird, phoenix
• Hearty, Playful, Elder, Aggressive-piercing; Dire-slashing: mountain eagle, raven, white crab, white moa, rainbow phoenix

I'll be updating this page and all the animal pages with this new data. Blood Red Giant 08:10, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

So I'm really starting to crack this damage type mystery. First off, a level 5 crane does in fact do slashing damage, even though its level 20 evolved counterparts all do piercing damage. However, in order to test whether it was the level of the crane or its evolution that caused the slashing damage, I used my high speed death leveling technique to produce a level 20 unevolved crane. I then went outside of compass range in order to reset the crane, and came back and tested its damage type. The level 20 unevolved crane did slashing damage just like its level 5 counterpart. As such, I believe damage type is solely dependent on the species and evolution of a pet, and is independent from its level. Using this new information, I will start collecting more information on the damage types of unevolved pets. However, this will take much longer as I will have to hunt down the pets in their natural habitats. If anyone wants to help me with the pets that won't turn hostile, let me know, since I'll need a second person to test those. Blood Red Giant 09:18, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Someone needs to get you a prize. That is a tonne of work. King Neoterikos 09:35, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

i have the moss spider if you would like to test it let me know.-- Zesbeer 09:36, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I'd love to. :) I'm in the middle of testing the unevolved raven right now, though, but go ahead and give me a pm in game when you have the time. Do you have all the tiers unlocked for it? Blood Red Giant 10:07, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and my IGN is Blood Red Giant. Blood Red Giant 10:07, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

normally i would but im going to sleep right now it being 3:36 am here ill add you to my friends list and yes i have all ters and lvls.-- Zesbeer 10:36, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

All research has been completed except for the following species: black moa, black widow spider, jingle bear, moss spider, and white moa. These aren't complete yet due to either not being able to find their Unevolved counterparts in the wild, or due to them not attacking in the wild. In order to test these I need a second person who has unlocked them on their account. If you have one or more of these creatures and would like to help, pm me in game (IGN Blood Red Giant). Thanks. Blood Red Giant 21:19, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Reset Indent With some much needed help from Zesbeer, I've completed my research on the pet damage types. I've established the damage type for all six evolutions (hearty, playful, elder, aggressive, dire, unevolved) for all 33 species. I'll be updating the wiki accordingly. Blood Red Giant 22:07, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Are you certain warthogs deal slashing? Jenosavel and Epinephrine always had hogs listed as untyped, because it wasn't slashing or piercing or any of the elementals (they were using the term "bite"-type damage, just to show that it was different from everything else). -Auron 22:10, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Warthogs dealing slashing was tested using Bladeturn Refrain with 34 armor vs. slashing and 0 armor vs. everything else. With those armor values, the range of slashing and the range of non-slashing don't overlap. Thus, the test was quite clear. However, Jenosavel and Epinephrine probably tested an Unevolved warthog as it would be the easiest to test. My test shows that unevolved warthogs do not deal slashing damage (and this is shown in my recent update of the damage table). However, I did not specifically prove that an unevolved warthog dealt Blunt damage over Piercing damage. I simply assumed, in this instance, that Silavor was correct in saying, "Warthogs begin fighting with blunt little snouts." Hope that clears some things up. Blood Red Giant 22:26, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

The damage type table and all individual charmable animal pages have been updated and should now be correct. Blood Red Giant 22:44, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Glad to see someone else doing this type of work :) I've been having fun since returning to GW (after a long hiatus) collecting the various pets for the menagerie. If only we'd had this when we did our testing! --Epinephrine 18:19, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I'll second that! I don't have as much time as I used to, but if anyone is trying to test pet stuff that requires a second player along, don't be afraid to ask me.Jenosavel 13:27, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

WARTHOGS ?!?!?!

Is there a chance that elder warthogs might still do blunt damage? I wish there was a 3rd damage type(Il Spiderpig Il 16:05, 6 June 2009 (UTC))

Unevolved Warthogs deal blunt damage. However, Elder Warthogs and all other evolutions deal slashing damage. If you wish to gain a level 20 unevolved warthog (the only level 20 pet that deals blunt damage), you must use high-speed death leveling to level the warthog before it can deal or take enough damage to evolve. As the death leveling page mostly talks about leveling a pet to Dire, rather than unevolved, I'll explain an extremely fast way of doing this. You will need 5 superior runes on yourself using the lowest armor possible. You will need a vampiric weapon for yourself, and you should have Charm Animal on your skill bar. You will need a mes/rit hero, with 16 fast casting and Flesh of My Flesh on the skill bar. You will need a necro/monk or monk/necro hero with 12 healing and 12 blood magic, and Offering of Blood, Blood Ritual, and Patient Spirit (or any other basic healing spell) on the skill bar. Set your two heroes to flee. Make sure the area around the pet is clear of enemies. Aggro the pet and let yourself die. After you have died twice, you will be at one life. With the vampiric weapon equipped, you will die almost instantly every time you are raised. As your heroes are set to flee, they will constantly kite the pet, thus reducing its damage. Using this method, the pet should reach level 20, unevolved, in ~ 20 min of afk. When you wish to charm the pet, switch to a different weapon set, and remove your armor. Hope that helps. ^{Blood Red Giant} _{Mani Mortus} 16:47, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

If you want a pet that will not attack back, death level those roaming at the Zaishen Menagerie (not summoned by Wynn)...

Not sure if Menagerie pets will evolve the same way "wild" pets would (given the fact that Pet Tamers will not pay 100g when they reach level 20 and they're reported to not grow the same way). --NIN37 20:40, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Not all of them can be death leveled. But some can. MithTalk 22:42, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

i death leveled every pet in the Menagerie. 2 necro mesmers...... and a me as a monk....-- Zesbeer 22:59, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm talking about the level 5 ones, not the ones created by Wynn. MithTalk 08:21, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Again, not sure if Menagerie pets share same traits as wild ones. But activating and canceling Charm Animal to turn them "hostile" (although they will not attack, their name will turn red) and continually dieing (low HP + Vampiric + fast resurrect + lots of time) in their aggro bubble should give them some XP...

Heard reports about pets not leveling up and Heroes deaths not giving them XP either, so might not work at all. --NIN37 15:49, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Clean up

im going to try and clean this page up ill make a copy of it on my user space and provide links with what i have changed here i would love for this page to look a little bit more like the armor page. ill post a link to the most resent version here once i have it somewhere near done.-- Zesbeer 08:46, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

ok well im not done yet but this is what i have so far feel free to change anything i have done just make sure you make a note of it either here or on that page talk page.. [1] also i intend to add a section about the Zaishen Menagerie that explains what it is and some links to it. -- Zesbeer 10:31, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

as you all can see i have applyed some of my changes that are on my project page right now.-- Zesbeer 21:10, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

gallery?

is there any way we could get a gallery of max leveled pets relative the size of their owner? i know that the rainbow pheonix isnt my particular cup of tea and im certain that there must be at least a few other peoplet hat desire their own particular flair. it would be nice to see what they all look like side by side. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:68.166.219.88 (talk).

I think that would clutter this page greatly, also the problem with the images would be that height of a character is variable. If i showed you a lvl 20 dire spider against a min height female monk and then showed you the same spider against a max height male warrior, the respective size of the spider would change vastly, as in the former it would look huge and in the latter it would look tiny. So i'm really not sure what it would gain us to do this as I don't think it would add any usable information. -- Salome 08:17, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

We could compare them to an NPC such as Wynn or a specific hero or henchman, but I think the images should be in the individual animal pages, and possibly in a gallery subpage. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 08:34, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Originally i brought this idea up, but Mr IP decided to delete it and made this topic his own. Anyways, my idea was to have something similar like the gallery of swords, shields, etc. That way you can easily see how every pet looks like. It's for example easier to see how the White Moa and Black Moa look similar (or different) next to each other. A subpage should work imo. The screenshots could be made at the Zaishen Menagerie next to Wynn. --DarqueXiroz 02:06, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Could be done, although the images should still not go on this page and should be contained on the individual animal pages and on a gallery subpage. However its still gonna be quite hard to compare with different zooms, screen sizes and various image sizes, not to mention the fact that one can not flag pets and trying to get them to stand still is nigh on impossible. I think it might just be easier to ask Emily if she has a free minute to cap a render of each of the pets in basic standing position to scale and for her to cap a set size item (such as npc etc) in the same scale for comparisons sake. -- Salome 02:41, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Subpage Yes, ask emily for renders next to a set height npc yes.-- Zesbeer 03:20, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

There could be quite a bit of work involved. There are 34 animal types and 5 different evolutions. And it's possible that the model files don't contain any information about alternate scales, which would mean that Emily would need to look into the NPC database. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 03:50, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Are pets Allies?

What are pets, are they allies? I know it will say somewhere on wiki but I just cant find where. Titan Crow 23:55 22 may 2008 (UTC)

Never mind, found it in "Basic mechanics and behavior". Titan Crow 00:07 23 may 2008 (UTC)

Death Lvling?

What is this? How do I do it? Eryops3 17:42, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

You can find a lot of information on it at Death leveling - anja 17:56, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Evolution

what is disputed and can we get concrete information? so we can get this page ready so it can be featured?-- Zesbeer 22:58, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

IIRC, "Damage" info is inaccurate. Page says +X% while in-game descriptions says +X..Y. And what exactly makes a pet evolve into "offensive" or "defensive" (damage dealt vs damage taken and amount of damage dealt by pet vs amount of damage dealt by player). --NIN37 00:36, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

I recently figured out a way to accurately control exactly how much damage a pet deals and receives while death leveling the pet in ~ 20 min. However, doing so takes two players and quite a bit of non-afk time. Still, if I find some time over the summer, I'll try and make those evolution boundries a little more concrete. Blood Red Giant 18:32, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I don't think that "Evolving an aggressive pet into an elder pet is difficult, and evolving a playful pet into an elder pet is nearly impossible" note should be there. If evolution is really tied to either "damage dealt vs damage received" or "damage dealt by pet vs damage dealt by character", one player wanting a certain evolution should just make sure to force such condition to happen. For example: letting the pet continuously hit a non-attacking enemy (Set of Armor, Master of Healing, etc) during hours while AFK = "large amount of damage vs little (none) amount of damage taken"; letting a bow-ranger attack the pet during hours (through a gate/hill/gap), on the other hand, would count towards "little/none amount of damage dealt vs high amount of damage taken". Both could be done through a little 1x1 scrimmage (with a healer hero to ensure pet/target does not die and, if that happens, quickly resurrect them). Again, not trivial/fast, but far from "difficult/nearly impossible" (assuming we just have to make sure pet deals/take large amount of damage while taking/dealing no damage). --NIN37 00:12, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

For me, it always worked very simply: Pets evolves while you use Beast mastery skills and pet attacks: pets becomes dire. Pet evolves with beast mastery 0: pet becomes hearty. I never got elder evolutions. MithTalk 00:55, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Classical death leveling = level 20 Dire pet with 0 beast mastery. :P

Using Junundu to power-level pets = Elder (but what's the point of getting an Elder evolution nowadays?). --NIN37 15:23, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, we don't know if uncharmed animals have any innate beast mastery rank. MithTalk 16:45, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

So.. I have had a minor setback with my research. Apparently creatures (or at least pets) do not gain experience for the death of Heroes. I tried death leveling with my heroes while I maintained aggro with my character in order to control the damage output of the pet. After many various attempts, I realized that no matter what I did, the pet would not gain experience from the death of my hero (Vekk). I even went so far to let the pet kill Vekk personally, obviously to no avail. This implies I will need a second account, one to death level, one to hold aggro. As such, since I only have one computer, I am going to wait until we have official word back on GWx2 before I continue with my research. ^{Blood Red Giant} _{Mani Mortus} 22:05, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

The pets that are spawned in the corral in the menagerie will be teleported back to the center of the corral if they venture too far outside of it. Using that you can position yourself and a ressurect-wielding hero such the pet can only ever hit you. You'll need to be somewhat outside the corral yourself (by the gate preferably, for speed purposes) and have your hero flagged at the very far end of your aggro bubble. When the pet kills you it will run at your hero, but will be teleported back to the center of the corral before it reaches your hero. You will be resurrected and will then body block it on its return course, thus becoming its target again. Doing this in combination with controlling my total HP through runes, counting deaths (hooray for /deaths!), and tallying stray damage (such as during the activation of Charm Animal), I was able to narrow down the damage dealt range to turn an aggressive pet into dire to between 1774 and 2101. That's still quite a range and will need to be both narrowed down further and verified across a range of pets, but it's a start.

This only takes into account the damage required to turn an aggressive to dire, and this method cannot be used to test the range turning an elder/unevolved pet aggressive (you can't spawn a level 5 in the corral and I've never seen a level 15+ pet turn aggressive or playful, despite the fact that you can now spawn level 15+ pets as aggressives or playfuls). I have no idea at this time how much damage a pet must take to turn playful or hearty, or how damage dealt vs damage received stack up against one another. I'd love to tackle these questions also, but for now I thought I would share what little I do know. Jenosavel 22:54, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, your reputation is obviously well placed; that is some really good research. Anyways, the 1774 to 2101 range is right along with my estimations, and I'll see what I can do about decreasing that range, and possibly coming up with an exact number. Although, right now I'm working on getting data off wild animals and thus I'm starting with unevolved->aggressive. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 07:37, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Next I'd like to be testing the level 12 Elder->Dire. I'll be interested to see if the numbers of unevolved->aggressive + aggressive->dire = unevolved->dire. One would hope so, but you never know. All the more I've uncovered so far is that elder->dire does indeed require more damage than aggressive->dire which means that the aggressive pets you spawn in the menagerie come with their internal counter already going. Much of my getting back into this testing was prompted by my first true fail at getting the pet evolution I wanted. I spawned an aggressive from the menagerie, gave it my usual training regimen and instead of Dire I got Elder, leading me to wonder if the spawned aggressives had an internal counter that started reset at elder. Well, that guess was wrong. Apparently in my typical training cycle I'm just already well past the point of aggressive by the time my pet reaches level 12.

The other question this raises for me is whether or not movement towards dire is really triggered by damage dealt, or by some measure of hits landed (the number enemies I kill, and thus damage the pet is dealing, between levels 5-12 isn't too much different than between 12-15, but at low levels they take many more hits to kill). The two are hard to separate though, as its hard to land many hits without dealing damage and its hard to deal damage without landing many hits. If we can definitively pin down a damage point at which a pet will evolve, then it will answer the question. If the damage point appears to move on us and refuses to be pinpointed, then we may have to consider the possibility of number of attacks landed being the key factor instead.Jenosavel 12:35, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, you may be right on the number of hits rather than the damage. First, though, a bit of explaination.

I've started using GWx2 even though ANet still has no comment on the subject. In reality, if they try to ban me for using it to test pet evolutions, I figure Gaile will reinstate me anyways. So, using two accounts, I have been able to hold aggro with a 55 monk while simultaniously death-leveling with the other character. By the use of Protective Spirit, Shield of Absorption, and Shielding Hands, I am able to hold the pet's aggro while not allowing it to deal any damage. Also, whenever I want it to deal damage, I'm able to simply stop using the SoA and SH, forcing the pet to deal exactly 5 damage with every hit. Using this method I've started to try and narrow down the range of damage needed to turn an unevolved warthog into an aggressive warthog. Now, the data is still very premature, and thus could be flawed by human error; however, my current research implies that there is no set break point for turning a pet aggressive. Here's what happened:

With my first attempt at using this method, I decided to test the following amounts of damage and see when the pet evolved: 500, 1000, 1500, 2000, 2500, 3000, 3500, 4000, 4500, 5000. The general idea was to start at level 10, have the pet deal 500 damage, go to level 11, have the pet deal another 500 damage, go to level 12, etc. while checking the evolution the entire time. However, the moment I hit level 11 with only 500 damage, the pet turned aggressive. Now, I then tried to pinpoint the break point a bit more by testing the damage from 50 to 500 in increments of 50. However, the pet never evolved, implying the break point may be exactly 500 (among other possible theories). So then I tried to test 450, 500, and 550 damage, none of which ended up turning out evolved. At this point I'm getting confused, and I decide to recreate the original experiment which produced the aggressive warthog. I leveled the pet up to level 10, had it deal exactly 500 damage, and then leveled it up to level 11. Sadly, it remained unevolved.

Now the reason I think your hit theory may be correct is that the key difference between the first experiment and the following ones was simply a matter of experience. I had no idea what I was doing the first time through. That's not to say I screwed up the data, but rather to say it took a very long time to actually run the experiment.. as in about an hour. In that time, the pet had hit me quite a few times for 0 damage, something I was taking for granted. Whereas, in the other experiments, I knew exactly what I was doing, and thus very efficently completed the experiments, usually in 15 minutes or less. If the number of hits is the key, rather than the damage, then my data is much more easily explained. On the other hand, as I said, it is still premature and could simply be flawed data.

As for your aggressive to elder problem, I have a bit of data for you to ponder. In my original experiment that produced the aggressive warthog, I actually allowed the pet to continue leveling without gaining any more damage. It evolved into an elder warhog. Now, this implied either the damage/number of hits resets when a pet evolves, or the break point for aggressive is less than the break point for dire. As such, I did another experiment where I let the pet hit me for 2500 damage at level 10 (well above what should be needed for dire). I then leveled the pet to 11 and then 15 with no extra damage. It turned aggressive and then dire, implying the damage/number of hits does not reset. As such, I think we are looking for two different break points, and if you get between those two break points, you'll end up with dire.

Apologies for the long essay, lol. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 13:49, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

If it is indeed the case that the number of hits dished out by the pet is what pushes it towards aggressive/dire, then it would probably be likely that it is hits taken, regardless of damage received, that pushes it towards playful/hearty. Could we be so lucky as to have them counter one another in a simple one to one ratio? This is definitely worth looking into. Time to start counting the whacks I'm taking...Jenosavel 19:34, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

(Reset Indent) Okay, you are going to love me for this. I death-leveled a warthog to level 10 while making sure it did zero damage (using the method mentioned previously). I then sat there with my 55 monk and tanked the warthog for 30 minutes, all the while not letting it do any damage what-so-ever. After 30 minutes had passed, I continued to death-level the warthog, and to my great satisfaction the warthog evolved into aggressive, and then dire. I have a few side theories, but this is pretty conclusive evidence that the evolution is based on number of hits rather than damage. Next I'll be testing if Shadow Form will allow me to tank the animal without it evolving, thus allowing us to control exactly how many hits it obtains. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 04:58, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

The damage a creature does an the damage received by the target are different things. You can deal 50 damage, but the creature can take 0 after armor and damage reduction calculations. MithTalk 09:15, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Which is included in my "side theories"; however, as it seems the break point for aggressive evolution is consistently 300 hits reguardless of damage variation, the hit theory seems to be the best one at this time. All the same, don't worry, Jenosavel and I have quite a bit of research left to go before we satisfied, and your concern about ignoring damage reduction is one of the concerns I plan on addressing once I have a better idea of where the break points are. Also, Jenosavel, the break point for aggressive seems to be about 300 hits, and the break point for dire seems to be somewhere between 450 and 500 hits (assuming starting with an unevolved pet). Also, I'm going to see about getting a counter, since counting hits for 10 minutes without missing one is.. difficult. If we want to figure out an exact number, it will take some very careful work. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 09:40, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Counting hits for a long time without missing one is indeed a careful affair. This is why we'll have to repeat the experiment a number of times to ensure that we average out any human error. I tend to keep a notepad on hand and write a tally for each hit. It's easier than trying to count and running the risk of losing your place. Additionally you can section off areas in rows and columns for any set of 5 tallies so that you can easily keep track of when you need to stop.

Since you seem to be doing well with the aggressive/dire testing and I lack 2 accounts to fully test it myself, I've switched over to trying to test the playful/hearty. Initial results bear out nicely. 300 hits taken by the pet is looking good for a break point to turn the pet playful. I can't definitively say yet where the break is for Hearty, although it appears to be above 475. For anyone else who may wish to join in, my methodology is such: pin the menagerie imperial phoenix so that it doesn't run about on me. Wand it while tallying hits up to the hit count we want to test. You will need to heal the animal with something like Heal Area. BiP myself to death with a hero using Flesh to res me until the animal levels up to the desired level. Run out of control sight range (holding control no longer displays the pet's name in red) and back so as to refresh the animal's name.

I use the imperial phoenix because it is the only pet of its species on the map and all pets of a species share a party such that to level one of them you must also level all of them. This slows down the death leveling as well as making it nearly impossible to keep track of which animal you were hitting. You don't need to pin the animal you're working with, but it does make the counting of hits easier since it won't be moving about constantly and causing you to need to swing your camera about. It's just one less thing to worry about when you're concentrating on getting an accurate count. I've found 3 successful places to pin the phoenix so far, 2 of which are shown below. Remember that you can't rely on your heroes to pin an animal, since as soon as it is aggressive they will feel the need to run away from it and back at random. A general warning though: attempting to pin a menagerie animal makes herding warthogs look like cake, so if those quests drive you crazy, don't even bother trying this. Jenosavel 12:16, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Due to a death in my family, my research will be put on hold for about a week. However, I thought you would like to know that I've already used your research to produce a level 20 hearty moss spider in the Zaishen Menagerie Grounds. I killed the second spider, death leveled the first spider up to level 10, used a pair of starter daggers with no dagger mastery to hit the moss spider between 600-700 times with approximately just as much damage while healing the moss spider with Healing Ring, and then finishing death leveling to level 20. Produced a Hearty Moss Spider fairly quickly, and would be even faster if using an IAS skill and doing only as many hits as required for Hearty. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 23:27, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I know I'm supposed to be on break, but someone made a change to the death leveling page implying that a level 5 pet there would always become Hearty reguardless of how many times it was attacked. As I always try to AGF, I decided to test this claim before editing the page. The method I used was simple: kill one of the moss spiders, don't attack the second, and death level the second. At level 11, the pet was still unevolved, leading me to the conclusion that the OP was incorrect. However, after editing the page, I went back to my game where the pet was already at level 14. I then checked the evolution again, just for the hell of it, and to my surprise, it was a Playful evolution. Not only that, but when it hit level 15, it went straight to a Hearty evolution. Now, I never attacked the pet once, and it never attacked me. Also, this is inline with some reports I had heard earlier about pets becoming Hearty whenever using Junundu to level them (and thus taking and receiving no damage). Just something to keep in mind. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 19:29, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I verified this with the menagerie phoenix. I aggro'd it by activating and canceling charm animal, then leveled it to 15 with BiP and Flesh. It took and received no damage. I refreshed the name at every level. At 11 it was still unevolved. 12 it went playful. 15 it went hearty. We'll need to figure out how this reconciles with pets that remain unevolved to level 15 and above. Jenosavel 00:57, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Okay, also verified this outside the menagerie with a SF partner holding aggro while I BiP leveled the pet. It's repeatable and consistent enough that I feel its safe to say any pet death leveled without being allowed to directly deal damage itself will result in a Hearty pet. However, I hesitate to go so far as to label Hearty as the "default" state of pets, due to the prevalence of Junundu leveling for unevolved/elder pets. Jenosavel 03:53, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

So, I've been able to do some tests in between visiting with family. Here's the information I've collected so far. Playful Evolution 11/12 breakpoint somewhere around 0 damage or 0 hits (needs more testing). Playful Evolution 12/13 breakpoint between 0-227 damage or 0-50 hits. Playful Evolution 13/14 breakpoint between 241-459 damage or 51-100 hits. Playful/Unevolved Evolution breakpoint between 469-571 damage or 101-125 hits. I'm testing this using SF and Gale on a Tiger with the damage/hits occuring at level 10, although Gale will need to be eliminated as a possible factor after more research. The damage is collected using 60 armor to remove possible damage reduction. Currently I'm reducing the range for the Playful/Unevolved Evolution breakpoint. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 16:48, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, I've been debating if we should move our research to a seperate page, possibly Animal_companion/Research. Otherwise this talk page may get overloaded fairly quickly. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 16:51, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

I created the research page. Just follow the link. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 21:24, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Not a sophisticated test, but interesting: I charmed a polar bear, and tried to evolve it by letting it fight HM Snow Wurms in Ice Cliff Chasms while I nuked them. With only 3 Beast Mastery, it was dealing 3-5 damage and taking around 30 per hit, and the wurms seemed to hit slightly faster. Got to level 12 without any interesting evolution, so I tried letting it fight a wurm while I simply healed (ie not dealing significant damage). After a while of this, I levelled it up to 13; still unevolved. At this point I figured I'd level it to 20 and then spawn an evolved level 15 version and level that up. However. when it hit level 14 it went Playful. Hitting level 15 remained at Playful until I zoned to the menagerie, at which point it went Hearty.

This matches Blood Red Giant's experience, above. While I make no claim to controlled conditions, does something strange happen at level 14 with playful pets? Nom 13:07, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

I have found a way to level a pet into whatever catagory the owner wishes, ex agressive, dire etc. The best place I have found was just outside Boreal Station against the snow worms in EOTN(eye of the north). the skills i used to do this to make pet agressive were sybiotic bond, half damage and +x hp regen, call of protection and shielding hands, damage reduction, predators pounce and brutal strike and feral lunge and the smiting skill strength of honor. the key to getting an agressive pet is high damage output with low damage taken. modify skills as needed to get the evolution you so wish to obtain, to get a playful or hearty pet, have high damage taken on pet with low damage given by pet. the best way i know to do this is to have you pet fight them worms with no beast mastery and no attack skills and the player kills the worms. since the worms are lvl 20, it doesnt take long to lvl up. put as many points in beast mastery since that alone increases pets damage output. a bonus to doing this is the dropping of items.

??

How many pets in guildwars?--FoxPromise 01:32, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

um well i count 33 Charm able pets.-- Zesbeer 03:20, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Why aren't Lions and Lionesses the biggest feline pets in GW?

Right, whats the story with lion and lioness sizes, they are both dwarfed by the tiger and wolf. Now surely, being in actuality, the biggest of all the big cats and being bigger than all canines (maybe not taller but in general bigger), they should be represented as such in the game. This is something thats really being annoying me for ages now and I would really like to see it changed. I use pets a lot (like every character and every hero on both of my accounts has one) and to date I've got round it by never having any one of my character have his heros charm lions and tigers together. But I realy like the idea of theming each of my characters pet, for example all feline pets (Lions/Lionesses, Lynxes, Melandru's Stalkers and Tigers/White Tigers) or canine pets (Black Wolves/White Wolves/Wolves and Hyenas) but when I have Lions and Tigers in the same party it looks ridiculous. I know its only an aesthetic thing and has no actual affect on game play but I reckon that its the small things that make the game.

I've also left this comment on both the Lion and Lioness discussion pages, sorry if thats a bit OTT. Titan Crow 01:01 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes it is OTT. Drogo Boffin 01:07, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

It's also kind of funny, since Tigers, on a whole in IRL, are bigger than Lions are. Elysea 01:14, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Not to mention this is a fantasy game. Drogo Boffin 01:16, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Also, in the Zaishen Menagerie, only Hearty and Elder Lions/Lioness are fully evolved in size. Elysea, I know that Tigers are really big but unless the safari parks and zoos I've been to are breeding particularly small Tigers or large Lions then I'd wager that they're definately bigger. Granted, I hav'nt exactly seen them stood shoulder to shoulder but I've seen them quite a few times now. And Boffin, where do Lions and Tigers fit into fantasy, somwhere with Griffens and Unicorns? Titan Crow 01:39 30 June 2008 (UTC)

@OP my point is that nothing has to fit into real lefe. and I have never seen a lioness the same size or bigger than a full grown tiger. Also I have seen Dire Lions/Lioness that are "fully evolved in size." Drogo Boffin 01:44, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

@OP: Google 'lion or tiger bigger' and see what comes up, :) Zoos are not a proportionate representation of the population at large, but my comment is moot anyway. I was just pointing out a bit of irony, and Drogo brought up another good point. In a world with phoenixes and Norn and Asura and giant wurms you can use burrow though sand, we can't say whether lions and tigers in that world are an accurate reflection of those in our own (minus the fact that female Lions are a reskin of Melandru's Stalkers. XD). Elysea 01:55, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Reset Indent Ok, after googling it and looking at it on wiki, I've found that although the Siberian tiger, averaging around 500/600lbs (but being recorded at 800+), is considered the largest subspecies of tiger (of which there is 6 subspecies) with the Bengal tiger averaging in at just under that at around 500lbs, all the other subspecies of tiger are 300lbs or under. The avarage weight of all 8 Lion subspecies is around 400/500lbs with their weight varying at lot less between subspecies. So all said I stand corrected, the tiger has the bigger subspecies (and considered the biggest for that reason) but on average and in general, the lion is the bigger of the two species.

And, I suppose, like Boffin said "nothing has to fit into real life" but a good deal of it is based on real life though, for example, most of the game terrain or general architecture (there is loads of complete fantasy terrain and architecture too). Most of the pets are based on real life too. But then again, maybe Boffin is dead right in "nothing has to fit" and we should forget the real life size of the lions and tigers and the Lions and Lionesses should be made massive in comparison to the tigers and wolves, keeping in theme with the lion being the king of all beasts. Titan Crow 11:24 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I don't care what you think, in terms of size, and excluding the abnormally big and fictional creatures like spiders or Phoenixes, the biggest should be the White bear, then the other bears, then the tiger. The lion would come after the tiger. The biggest tiger (Over 227Kg, Siberian Tiger) is bigger than the biggest lion (Barbary Lion, roughly 200Kg, extinct in the wild) so, sorry to burst the bubble. Tigers win. Biggest is a superlative, so one is enough to be the biggest. And we don't know which was the species used in GW, so if it bothers you so much, think that the subspecies of Kournan lions are smaller than the subspecies of Canthan tigers. Anyways, spiders are not as big as they appear in GW, so sizes don't matter. MithTalk 12:22, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Ok fella, thankyou for not caring what I (and other Guildwiki users) think, I imagine that your an integral and appreciated part of the guildwiki community. As reguards to "Biggest is a superlative", the largest Feline ever found was a North Americian Lion (Panthera leo atrox, now extinct) but this has nothing to do with the point I was making when added this post. I Asked "Why aren't Lions and Lionesses the biggest feline pets in GW?" as I thought, at the time, that they were the biggest feline (across the board) but as Elysea rightly pointed out that tigers are the biggest (superlative) but I Conculded they are not in general (average size of all subspecies) So we had established the size difference and that the size of anything doesn't really matter, as Boffin said, that "nothing has to fit into real life". But thank you again for your opinion , and your probabley right, the Polar bear should be the biggest pet.

Anyway, I personally think that the Lion and Lioness should be a bit bigger, at least as big as a tiger or wolf, if not maybe a bit bigger. Titan Crow 14:20 30 June 2008 (UTC)

O_o? This is not Guildwiki. MithTalk 17:37, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, My bad! "Guild Wars Official Wiki" Titan Crow 17:56 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Let's have the spiders 1 pixel big, too! Actual size is fail for video games. Scaling similar creatures would be a waste of time anyways... <>Sparky, the Tainted 23:45, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Attack speed

Is nowhere to be found in the article. What is the attack speed of animals? 1.75 seconds? 2 seconds? MithTalk 12:24, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Attack rate. Misery 12:26, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Damage Calculations

Was the damage shown against 60-100 armor dummies in the Isle of the Nameless, or was it against one type of armor? Than 03:03, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Damage calculation is based on the expected damage against a level 20 target with 60 Armor Level (i.e., level 20 spellcasters with no armor upgrades). --NIN37 11:10, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Death and Enemys experience

earn enemys exp truh death of of a pet ? ^^ i wuld like to know it for Death lvling in prof-tut <^sorry im not used to write in englisch ^^ my question might sound strange ^^

Only the first pet death counts toward enemy experience. After that, they do not receive any more experience. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 02:55, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

oh .... thats hard i hoped a litel that i might give them a litel extra exp truh my pet --77.131.137.201 02:58, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Innate +damage%

As of now pets are supposedly receiving a natural +33% damage modifier. I think it's worth running some numbers with a pet in the field to see how this extra damage interacts with armor. I'd be quite surprised if it was armor ignoring, but there's no way to know until we try it.

Actually, it'd be worth looking into how the 33% damage reduction interacts with Call of Protection as well.Jenosavel 12:52, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm really more concerned with whether pets have recieved a 33% boost to their base damage, or whether all damage they deal is added up and then a +33% modifier tacked on. If the latter, then all pet attacks are recieving a free +33% bonus to their attack damage that is not listed in their discriptions.70.58.233.132 18:22, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Ive been testing this with that question in mind, I have found that using the Effective Damage calculation system on the GW wiki page "Damage calculation" that the +33% is figured after ALL calculation, this means that skill bonuses are affected as well. As an example if you have a level 15 Elder pet and you are attacking a target with 100 AL using Scavenger strike at 12 BM You will hit for approximately 37-47 damage. Ill use the equation from the Wiki page, (see the "Damage calculation" GW Wiki page for a description)

ED = [([RD × DScale × AE] + DShift) × DMult] + DNeg

a more elaborate version

ED = [([RD × DScale × (2^[(EffDR-EffAR)/40])] + DShift) × DMult] + DNeg

ED = ((((27*1*(2^((60-100)/40)))+22)*1)+0)*(133%)

You can put that into the google search(yay google calc, It's hat I used :D) bar and end up w/ about 47 damage I then calculated the minimum the same way and then tested it on the 100 AL Suit or armor and got the same results.

I have only tested this with Scavenger strike and with Strength of honor. I hope it is like this with many skills XD

Think about it!! with 16 BM Brutal strike a Hp<50% foe!! thats a TON of spike damage, and from a pet too! I mean ranger not barrage spike! I'm psyched!

   -PS I'm new to GWiki so please let me know If Ive done something wrong :D

117.47.7.202 18:47, 25 October 2009 (UTC)Habar414/Chuck Chuckelson

ANimal Companion Monument

I recently leveled a pet to level 20 then stuck him in my HoM. Not a special one like spider/black moa/etc.. just a normal one, and this gave me an animal companion monument. But if I now level another normal pet to 20, can I then add another animal companion monument in my HoM for that pet too? Or can you only have one? 78.147.24.151 21:18, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Only 1 i think, unless you level a imperial phoneix or black widow, or get a black moa. personn5 21:19, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Rate of Experience Gain

Quick story: Leveled a hero from 11 and bear from 16 in HM. They both reached 19 at nearly the same time. After the hero reached level 20, I had to kill approx. 130 more baddies (plus a few bosses) in HM before my pet reached level 20. There was only one pet, I completed maybe one quest, and most baddies were level 26. Do pets normally level this slowly? Or could I have made other silly mistakes? 96.48.131.210 13:32, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Benefit from XP Scrolls?

I'm just now getting around to levelling all my various Menagerie pets, and I'm wondering whether I can speed things along by using scrolls? The scrolls state that "your party" gains additional experience, so my guess is that they would not affect pets (who are allies, not party members). But can anyone confirm this for me? Thanks! --66.116.33.57 03:07, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

I theorize that pets gain experience not with your party, but with you personally. I have seen pets gain levels at different rates when all four were charmed at level 5, no experience gained between charms, and they level up differently. Notably my pet is the slowest to gain levels, and I am more often dead than my allies when I train pets in the Desolation in Junundu swarms. So it is possible that experience scrolls benefit the pets, indirectly. I will experiment with this. Kyubiko 02:40, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, pets earn experience the same way Charr do in The Northlands. They belong to a separate party, and that party gets experience whenever anything dies in the area. You can test that by trying to level up with 1 and 8 animals present. When there is just one animal, it levels up faster than when there are more. So, being a separate party, XP scrolls won't affect them.MithTalk 03:17, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Just did testing, level 5 animals with the party, one run without scrolls to see how fast the pets get to level 6, and once with a scroll. It took the same amount of enemies (Using a Scroll of Hero's Insight for double the gain in the party), and they all leveled up simultaneously. Next I will test the theory about pets not gaining experience if the owner is dead. Kyubiko 04:02, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Further testing: Had two pets in party, one with a dead owner while the other's owner was allowed to live. One pet leveled to 7, the other remained at level 5. Next test: Seeing how long it takes one pet to level up compared to four. Kyubiko 04:40, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Pets don't gain experience any faster for fewer pets in the party. Same number of enemies were needed to be killed before the single Pet would reach level 6. Next test: Seeing if fewer party members will increase pet experience. (they don't benefit from scrolls, but I think they might gain the same base experience you do) Kyubiko 04:50, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Final test complete. Pets do in fact gain experience faster if you have fewer people in your party. A party of five with four pets made the pets level up faster (38 xp gained per level 26 kill with 8, 60 xp gained with 5) than a party of 8 and one pet. So in summation:

• Pets do not benefit from experience scrolls.
• Pets do not gain less experience if more pets are in the party.
• Pets gain experience only if the owner is alive.
• Pets gain experience regardless of being alive or not, and regardless of distance from pet to owner.

Hope this helps clear up a bunch of the mystery concerning pets, and if someone feels this should be on the main page for pets, feel free to add it where appropriate. I'm not really confident in my ability to add new stuff yet :) Kyubiko 05:01, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

dire pets

i was wondering how i can train a dire pet i have no idea how to... do i use skills for my pet and kill guys with my pet alone or what i have no idea... or whats the best evolution for a pheonix or pets in general?

The commonly accepted theory is: if the pet deals more damage than it takes, it becomes dire; if the reverse, hearty. To do this, use Pet Attacks/Shouts that increase the pet's damage output or attack speed, and not as many on its health. You should also let it do the attacking while you or someone else tanks if possible. Don't quote me on these, I haven't done it in a long time. (Oh, and by the way, you reach the Aggressive/Playful evolution sooner, and the pet's path is already set from there.)

Whether you want dire or hearty depends on whether you want damage or health (respectively), but the difference isn't major. Most players would go for dire, at least in PvE, where each player is less responsible for their own survival than in PvP.

In other news, I see that this page badly needs a rewrite/cleanup. Maybe tomorrow or on the weekend I'll do it... | 72 (UTC) 01:10, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

AI target preference

This is in regards to my revert. The AI targets enemies with lower armor and/or lower health. A hearty pet would have 540 health and 80 armor, which is higher than a Ranger vs physical. That is why AI will preferentially target the ranger instead of the pet in some cases. Also melee AI will run a bit farther than your front line into a bit into your midline before engaging any targets and will proceed to target and attack the lowest armor/health targets in range. This is more prominent in Hardmode. --Lania Elderfire 23:21, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

damage stats

you can talk to Wynn to see the damage ranges for all evolutions of pets. why is the wiki's damage chart still have question marks there? is it because Wynn's data is unrealiable?

This is most likely because it isn't tested. Official in game description has been different to what actually happens in game fairly often. --Lania Elderfire 19:06, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

rewrite

Of course if I have missed anything or done anything wrong please post it under this section. I kept track of all the information and when reordering/rewriting the article, and I made sure it came back (unless it was a duplicate. There are still some duplicates, though, because it was more convenient). But of course I may have made mistakes. I did not touch any tables or stats. Thanks | 72 (UTC) 05:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, Sparky, for reconciling our edits | 72 (UTC) 18:51, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

My dear IP, I admire your dedication, though it is misguided. Also, I couldn't fit this line in the summary so here you go: I didn't realize you'd edited an earlier version, in which it still said "causes them to loses" or something ridiculous of that sort. Or else someone re-introduced that silly error; you will notice if you carefully read the history that I also corrected it before. What worries me now is that if you edited an earlier version, some other important changes might have been lost, so I hope someone else just accidentally reintroduced it, otherwise we shall revert to before your edit | 72 (UTC) 16:00, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

MithranArkanere reintroduced that error[2] and you edited their edits. According to that link, Sparky, the Tainted fixed it. That was when I stepped in to correct abnormally worded sentences. 68.101.94.165 16:13, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I checked one edit previous and, in fact, you changed it and Sparky reworded it. 68.101.94.165 16:15, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Wunderbar, then | 72 (UTC) 16:59, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Spells was my mistake, thanks Mith | 72 (UTC) 22:50, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Wild ones: Friend or Foe?

I've found some incongruences while trying to make the ally, foe and animal companion pages concord in what they say about wild animals. So I'll try to deal with this once and for all and then make the last change. Note that for 'wild animal' I mean those animals that spawn with dark green names and will turn hostile when attacked, not those that wander in the menagerie, neither those that appear as lime-named allies like the White Moa or the Wintersday reward animals.

• Most sources say that they are "passive foes", with the anomaly of having green names.
• Some sources say that they are allies.

So, let's go to the basics. I've just tested all of this, and it is like this.

• They spawn with green names like some allies that may appear in the party panel or follow the party and help them.
• When 'select nearest ally' key is hit, they will be selected if they are the nearest creature.
• They CANNOT be target of skills that target allies.
• If the player character or a hero is instructed to cast a non-offensive skill upon a green animal, they will cast it upon themselves instead.
• Most offensive AoE effects affect them, but some do not, like some shouts.
• Once they are attacked once, they fully turn hostile, but the AoE effects that do not affect them still do not affect them.
• Once they turn hostile, allied AI-considers them foes and attack.
• AI-controlled party members will NOT attack passive enemies unless instructed to, just like with animals.
• Charm animal can target both foes and allies. That's for sure, since some animals appear as plain allies (jingle bear) and some as hostile foes.

So, the only 'ally traits' they have is being targeted by the client when the 'target ally' button is clicked, the green name, and not being affected by some skills that target foes. So, this is what I think. Which is probably what has been researches before: Wild animals are passive foes with names 'artificially tagged' so AI do not attack them, but not actual allies, so they cannot be target of skills that target allies. Any argument against that? MithTalk 21:24, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

The evidence is convincing. I vote for them not being allies, which corresponds with my last edit (and summary). | 72 (UTC) 22:49, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Another vote in agreement. Blood Red Giant Mani Mortus 02:11, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Guard mode

The article says that when a pet is set to guard mode the pet will act as a minion. Minions will attack anything that aggros them and cannot be controlled thus, however I have found that the owner must attack a target with their weapon (or at least begin to) for the pet to attack that target. If an elementalist for example would just use spells on a target the pet would just be idle near his owner (the elementalist in this case). I think that either the owner or the pet must be attacked or the owner has to attack with their weapon for the pet to also attack that target in guard mode. Zalnaxical 12:28, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Movement speed?

Do pets have an innate 20% bonus speed modifier like Call of Haste mentions?

I have added that line to the article; nice noticing it wasn't there.

For some reason I forgot to wonder if the CoH page is right... oh well, someone can dispute it if they know it's wrong... | 72 | 22:08, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Pet footprints

Has anyone noticed that all pets seem to have human footprints? Animus Vinco 20:26, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Bees as pets

It is a great pity that we can't charm bees. A Swarm of Bees would make the coolest pet ever, even better than a raven in my estimation. Can you just imagine a huge swarm of level 20 bees being set on a monster? My kingdom, my kingdom for a swarm of bees. --La Visiteuse 12:47, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Bee-ee-eeeessssss Yes! Ravens are cool - the very idea of a raven as big as my character (female Monk so very small, but even so...) is cool - but towing around a swarm of bees... And how about a whole party full of players and heroes all with bees as pets? Cynique 13:33, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Pet Size

~Anyone know what has a larger 'skin'?> A Self Raised/Death Leveled lvl20 Dire[pet]~OR~ A Menagerie Capped lvl20 Dire[same type pet]???

It would be larger mesh, not skin, But no. all of them are exactly the same at 20 (i mean, against eachother, ex. a moa is bigger than a rat.)--Neil2250 17:43, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Linked videos

The first two videos contain content from UMG. It is not available in your country., and the third one has been muted. I dislike linking to content that is not generally available. --zeeZ 21:49, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Hero pet

Uhm, is there a way to add a name for your heroes pet?

No, not for hero's pets; only for the player toon's pets.  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 03:51, 30 December 2010 (UTC)